Survival
by Nightshade22
Summary: Ally a 16 year old girl is alone and fending for herself against the hordes of the undead. CHAPTER 5 ADDED.
1. Chapter 1

Ally rested the heavy rifle on the window ledge, she got down on her knees and positioned herself behind it. Her legswere shaking violently, making it almost impossible for her to keep still. She closed her eyes and took in a deep breath.

Her fingers already bandaged and blistered refused to grasp the weapon securely without shooting pains ricocheting up her arm causing her to clench her teeth and her eyes to water. It had been days since she could make a fist, weeks since she could throw a decent punch. Not like she needed to anyway, she wouldnt let those things get any closer to her than five feet. If need be, she ran like hell, dodging and avoiding the open mouths and snapping teeth, rancid flesh reaching for her.

She remembered the first time she fired a rifle, almost knocked her out, flew a foot backwards onto a brick wall. But she got used to it, went through alot ofguns, rifles and revolversover the months, never really knowing their names or what they were called. Not like in the movies when they asked the hero what gun he used and he would say ''AK 47'' or ''20 millimeter something...'' All she knew was just getting the bullets in,aiming, andblasting away dead fleshand then moving on. No sense in looking at the packaging when you had the legions of the damned hungry and aching to have a bite out of you. Just keep one slung overyour shoulder each timeyou went out to raid for food or change shelter. That was her motto. Never leave home without it. She shuddered to think of herself weaponless. Just another girl, just another slice of pie served warm for the hordes of hungry undead.

She forced her index finger to bend carefuly, over the trigger, aimed and braced herself, BANG! Right to the head, the bastard toppled over and she watched the one next to it stop and sniff the air, or that was what she thought it was doing. It gave out a moan that sent the familiar wave of nausea into her stomach, she aimed the rifle at it and it too went down with a sharp crack to the head.

She rested herforehead on the ledge, her hands unclenching the rifle, slowly laying it down beside her. Her hands throbbed and already her blisters started to stain the new bandages she put on. She had the urge to cry, and ball herself up in the corner of the stinking room she was hiding for the night, but she wiped off the few tears that escaped her eyes away with the back of her hand and searched her vest for a cigarette.

She remembered the first day of the outbreak, her foster parents being taken away on trucks after they had been attacked by those...those...things. She knew pretty well what they were now. One of themout there. She couldnt help but feel bitter watching them being carted away by the army as she stood on the front porch. ''Stay here ok?'' a balding officer told her ''well come get you in an hour or two, were just gonna send your folks to the hospital. just wait it out abit, dont go out of the house, keep your doors and windows locked. well be back to get you soon.''

Ofcourse they never came, things just started to get worse from there, riots in the city, people dying everywhere, the infection spreading at an unimanigable scale...and there she was, sixteen and staring out of a window in a darkened house at an empty street, getting more and more afraid as the day wore off into night. By dusk she got her backpack out and stuffed it with two shirts, a pair of pants and underwear. Two flashlights, batteries, two cans of tuna, a can of beans and a can of soda. Strapped on her hiking boots, zipped up her sweater, pulled her cap over her head and gripped her baseball ball tightly. With one arm she secured her knapsack on her shoulders and ventured out into the night, making for the hospital where she knew her foster parents would be.

Now, laughing to herself, she thought it very lucky for her to have survived that one night with nothing but a bat to protect her. But ofcourse the infection hadnt spread as much as it has now. She remembered bashing in one of those things in the head with her bat and running for a grocery store, hiding in one of the small store rooms, bawling her head off, crying for anybody, anyone to save her.


	2. Chapter 2

Ally lit her cigarette with trembling hands, it was broken on one side and she had to hold it in the middle to be able to get a good drag without the smoke escaping prematurely. That was another thing to put up on her wall of achievements. Smoking. She used to be the girl with the strict vegan diet, save the whales, say no to aerosol, all that crap.

And look at her now, trying to smoke a broken cigarrete and dreading the fact that it was her last one. She had the boys back at the first indipendent militia she stayed with to thank for it.

Showed her that it was the only thing other than alcohol that made shooting walking corpses in the head feel just a tad less disturbing.

Sure helped to be able to hold something in her hands on the nights when sleep wouldnt come and the anxiety was like a piano over your head ready to fall.

Ofcourse, those boys were long gone, and she hated to think that she survived the attack because she was busy taking a shit in a ditch. Haha.

While she took the crap of her life those boys were ripped apart and eaten in their sleep, all because the stupid sentry fell asleep with a penthouse magazine in his lap and his fly open. She cringed at the memory of their screams, the sound of guns going off sporadically, of breaking bones and the sound of a dozen hungry moans.

Now here she was, in this dingy room, in a flea infested house with boards nailed on the windows by previous inhabitants and two inches of grime on the floor.

She exhaled a stream of smoke and let her head fall back against the wall. The light that drifted in from the window was turning into a dull orange as the afternoon wore on, slowly, making the sweat drip from her neck down to her tailbone, soaking the wifebeater she had on and the waistband of her jeans. How long was it since she

had a shower? Since she actually changed into clean clothes? Days? Weeks? Six months ago she wouldve laughed at the notion of her wearing the same thing for days on end, smelling like a goddamn sewer or worse.

She drummed a beat onto the dirty floor, blowing dust particles that drifted in with the light array so that they swirled in circles before her eyes. She must have drifted off to sleep because the next thing she heard was a click and them a sharp bang. The sound echoed in the quiet street behind her. She sat quietly for a few seconds before she heard someone outside cry out, ''Help! Anyone! Help me!''

She cursed and scrambled to her feet, rubbing her sore arms and swinging her rifle to her shoulder, holding it up good and ready. She looked out into the street and saw somebody running and dodging about twenty of those things. She cursed again. That shithead led the whole goddamn horde down here! She cried aloud. She ran across the room and out the door, positioning herself on the front porch.

''In here!'' she called out. The guy looked up with a bewildered expression on his face as he shot at the things behind him and missing each time.

Ally steadied the rifle and fired, catching one right behind the guy who was running at full speed towards the house.

Two others fell and her side hurt from the way the firing made the steel on the chair she was leaning on slam into her ribs. The guy ran up the porch and into the house, locking the door behind him.

''Hey! Fuck!'' Ally screamed getting up quickly and rummaging in her belt bag for a grenade, she yanked the pin out with a force that made her teeth hurt in her head and threw it right in the middle of those things. She almost went down with those things as the bomb exploded charring the paint off the porch walls, she finished off what was left of them before falling to her knees and finally bursting into tears.

When she finally composed herself she reloaded her rifle and stared into the approaching dusk and at the litter of bodies on the street. Aiming the rifle at the lock on the door she fired and burst into the house.

''Where the fuck are you? You almost got me killed you shithead? Come out! Where the fuck are you?''

She heard a click and felt cold steel press at the back of her head.

''Right behind you bitch. Now drop your gun.''

Her face went numb as the blood drained from it. The man held his gun to her head, and from the feel of it he was shaking just as much as she was.


	3. Chapter 3

Ally let her shoulders sag beaneath the weight of the rifle and slowly swung it down to the floor, her fingers grasping it by the worn leather strap. She focused on a fly

that crawled lazily on the wall in front of her, her heart hammering in her chest. She cursed herself angrily for falling for his trap, she shifted her weight to her right leg, the tension in the room dripped like honey on a hot knife.

"Goddamn you," she mumbled through gritted teeth "i saved your stupid life you fucking cunt."

She heard him chuckle behind her, digging the gun harder into the back of her neck. She closed her eyes hard till green clouds fogged up her vision.

" Thanks princess, but i can take over from here." he rasped, smelling like dirty urinals.

She gave out a small cry as he pressed a foot to her back and kicked her roughly to the floor, the wind temporarily knocked out of her. She watched him from beneath a curtain of her hair as he reached down and scooped the rifle up from the floor, yanking the strap roughly from her fingers. Slowly she got up and skootched slowly to the wall opposite him, her back pressed against the hard wood. Wanting to melt into it, to disappear.

She watched as he rummaged in his pocket and took out a box of cigarrettes, taking out a stick with his yellow teeth and lighting it with a rusty butane lighter. She saw that he was twice her age, his glasses grimey and perched ontop of his nose crookedly, she began to loathe him with every fiber in her body.

"How old are you anyway?" He asked interrupting her thoughts, he was sitting on her cot and rummaging through her backpack. Oh yeah, shed enjoy watching him suffer.

When she didnt reply he gave out a deep throated snort and spat clear across the room, his bile spit landed theatrically by her shoe. Ally grimaced and looked away. She wouldnt be suprised if before the rise he was a computer nerd, staring fixed at a computer screen in a dark room oogling violent porn on flashy websites, the light from the monitor reflecting on his drool. Yeah that was what he was most likely. Or a mamas boy masturbating under posters of Creed and Pantera while his mom cooked spaghetti in a martha stewart kitchen. She sneered at the image. All she knew was that he was a parasite, and she thought about nothing else but the future bliss of watching him suffer.

She imagined strapping him to a tree and watching as the undead tore at his pudgy belly, pulling out his guts in strings while he cried like a girl. Yeah, she bet a whole case of bullets that he was the type to cry when he was cornered, heaving and sniveling like the bitch that he was.

"Your tougher than you look, but i bet i can make you soften up." he grinned menacingly. The nostrils in his pug nose flaring.

Ally quickly shot a disgusted look at him, the idea of this man taking advantage of her made her want to laugh, cry and puke all at the same time. He raised a pudgy hand to his mouth, wiping spit from his thick lips. Her heart stopped as his hand snaked down to his crotch and unsnapped his jeans in one quick movement.

"come here." he murmured.

Ally wrestled with her thoughts, she shot a panicked look across the room for anything sharp or heavy, a burning sensation rutted in her skull as her heart beat mercilessly in her chest. She watched him undo his zipper and she scrambled to her feet.

"Where are you going you little shit?" He cried out in suprise, aiming the rifle right at her head.

"Id rather take my chances on the streets you pig." she spat out. Anger darkened his face as he stood up suddenly, zipping himself up with one hand, the other still pointing the rifle at her. She watched him storm across the room, and she dodged a blow as he swung the rifle at her, with one move she planted the heel of her boot into his gut and heard him grunt. Struggling with the adrenaline that washed over her body, she lunged at the rifle.

A thick arm grabbed her by the scruff of her shirt and slammed her against the wall.

"Stupid mangy cunt!" he breathed in her face. Ally choked back tears as her head pounded from the impact.

Grabbing her roughly by the arm he dragged her out of the door, unhooking her granade pouch before kicking her again, and she went flying down the porch steps, he steadied the rifle at her, spit forming on the sides of his mouth. Then with a satisfied grunt he left her lying there, heading back into the house.

Ally licked the blood from her lips and slowy pushed herself up with her hands, sharp gravel and broken glass digging into her palms. The dusk was just starting to settle and she was suddenly overcome by a deep sense of dread as she watched a a breeze scatter dead leaves across the empty street before her. She felt naked and alone, and panick almost overcame her until an unexpected anger welled in her chest. She balled her fists and stepped over the charred remains of the dead, making her way down the street, there was one thing and one thing alone that overtook all thought in her mind. Revenge.


	4. Chapter 4

Rain started to fall down hard and heavy, the cold water rushing down drainpipes and gutters, seeping into the parched earth, ripping leaves from the trees. Ally stood before the broken window of Harolds Gun Emporium, her hair plastered to her pale face, her eyes squinted, blinking away water. She didnt mind that she was right in the middle of the city center, she took off running the minute she noticed the clouds darkening, heard the slow rumbling of thunder overhead. She didnt mind the rain seeping into her clothes and making her shiver slightly. She closed her eyes for the very first time outside a shelter...for the very first time out in the open. She closed her eyes, tilted her head to the heavens and let the rain fall on her face. She smiled.

No, she didnt mind. Didnt mind at all.

Rain was sensory overload for the undead, to them it was like trying to walk in a tv static world. All they saw were billions of water droplets streaking down the sky, like getting bad reception on your tv.

'All they hear is the sound of the wind, the sound of the rain hitting things; roofs, cars, the street...their heads. Its too much for them, all they can do is stand mouth open, staring at the sky.' She remembered the soldier who told her this, he himself staring fixed at the heavens, cloudless and burning with stars.

He had given her her first cigarette that night, laughed when she coughed and patted her back when tears welled up from her hacking and laughing at the same time. It hadnt rained for over a month then.

'Rain, our secret ally, he had said in a gruff voice. 'If it had rained for even five minutes when this all started, we couldve prevented the rise, held it down, controlled it...yeah. Somethings wrong with the world alright, when the rain wont fall anywhere in the world, and if it did, hell it wouldnt last, what, ten seconds?'

Despite this, she had never felt so safe, he was a big bear of a man, with smiling eyes and a crucifix necklace that twinkled in the dark. He had taken her in, shielded her, taught her everything he knew about...well, whatever they were. She smiled remembering the way he barked at the other soldiers when they got too touchy feely. He was like a second dad to her...He had died the very same night, after their rain talk, attacked in his sleep. Ally fought the constricting pain in her throat, the burnin in her eyes. And where was she when he needed her?

She had tried, she told herself, she had ran down to the encampment and shot her rifle at them like crazy, whipping it this way and that, her arms bruised, battered, her eyes streaked with hot...hot tears. Only she had to give up, there were too many...far too many of them. She had reeled and made a run for it, she ran like a coward. She shouldve stayed to fight, shouldve died with those men, with him...

But he had taught her something valuable. This time, she wouldnt run away, shed go back and take what was hers...her pride.

Ally balled her fists and stepped over the open window, avoiding the sharp glass that stuck out from the sides of the frame. She scanned the darkened shop for any sign of movement, softly she padded her way to the gunracks. She trailed a hand warily over boxes of bullets, remington, winchester, federal...shivering, she picked up a case and stuffed it in her right pocket. Crouched on the floor, she examined the bullets that had been ripped from their boxes and littered the floor in what looked like haste and panic.

She closed her eyes, imagining the men and women who had come in here before her, seeking the temporary safety of weapons...and from the looks of things, it didnt seem to have worked a whole lot. She shifted her foot away from the crusty brown stain of blood that had hardened and coated the floor beneath her.

And thats when she heard it...the unmistakable shuffle of feet behind her...

"Huh." she said under her breath. The nausea settled itself slowly in the pit of her stomach. She balled her fist. She heard it...smelled it...sensed everything all at once. Her back stiffened and she dug her nails into her palms, the flimsy bandages strained...the blood starting to pool...Bracing herself, she spun around quickly, just in time to see the little zombie girls head explode just as it lunged for her...

Ally sat shell shocked, trying to come to grips with what had just happened...

She heard a metallic ping and the soft click of what seemed to be a lighter, in the dark a flame shot out and lighted a cigarette. She scrambled to her feet.

"Good evening." The man said slowly, exhaling smoke into the air, blue eyes shining almost luminous from under a black cowboy hat.


	5. Chapter 5

In the beginning, there was Man and he stood great and tall. The land bowed down at his step and the animals surrendered to his will...Then God looked upon the Man and was not pleased.

He had seen the heavens turn sour and the oceans decay...Watched the animals look out from cages filled with the filth of humanity, disease took the good and corruption the bad... God cried and said unto himself, I shall end this suffering, and inflict a wound upon the already infected earth.

God Watched as Men died and did not rise in spirit, but roll hungry out of the beds from which they lay in the soft earth. The infected shall infect and thus in turn spread the disease of humanity, for who better to carry the virus of mankind than man itself? In their blood, in their mouths, able to rip the life from infants and carry them into a new hell.

Man bow down to the greatest evil, sink to your knees and know its name, for it is Man that shall destroy Man. Teeth upon teeth, flesh upon flesh.

(Spraypainted over a mobile phone billboard, Nevada, city limits, three months after the rise.)

* * *

Gunner had seen alot in the past months, a hell of a lot more than one person should in a lifetime. Hell, he had even put down his own family...his son, Johnny...

All his brain would allow him to remember now without the pain was the little towhead running across a blacktop after a red ball. He remembered the sky, blue and bright, the no worries type that hung over feel good movies and sesame street intros. Johnny was such a giver, always giving more than he wanted to take. Gunner thought about the red ball, how it bounced way up into the sky, a red drop on blue...landing safely in his sons pudgy arms...

And then the fast forward...

The screaming, the yelling, the old man with the farmers apron staggering into the park full of kids, eyes slack...hungry eyes...

"look daddy! Its mister Albach!"

Then the blood...the small hands grasping the old mans shirt sleeve, grabbing on for dear life as the old man lifted the boy by the hair with strenght Gunner never thought the old man could posess... "Johnny!" He had screamed as he watched his fathers friday night poker buddy sink his fake chompers into his sons neck, the pearls of teeth breaking upon impact, falling with a chink onto the blacktop, but not before they had severed his sons tiny neck arteries, spilling warm blood on the white apron...

Butcher, butcher...whats there to eat? Gimme a slab of that sunday meat...

He had knocked the old man down, grabbed his son and made for the car...then...the dying, the screaming, the panic...and the little red ball rolling under an empty pram...

Gunner bit his tongue hard, erasing all thought from his mind. His eyes focused once again on the waife like girl in front of him, huddled amongst the shelves. He felt the cooling wet of rain and wind on his back, and he felt no tingle, he knew all was well...for now. He stepped over the body of the zombie that had lunged for this kid earlier and held out his hand in a friendly gesture. She stared at it, not knowing what to do. He let his rejected hand fall akwardly and rubbed the palm on his jeans.

"You alright?" He asked. She raise her eyes to him and he saw that they were watery, filled up with shimmering tears. Her hair hung dirty and limp, framing a pale face with cracked lips. He saw that she had once been beautiful, before the loneliness, the harshness and before reality took away everything pretty, in place for a feral wild that had a better chance of surviving.

"You been using rifles?" He asked pointing to her bandaged hand, raising his again, showing her his own battle scars. Not as bad as yours, but thats coz you probably had soft hands."

"I got nothing..." She whispered softly, he had to bow his head to hear.

"What?" he asked, blowing out a wisp of smoke into the air.

"I said i got nothing." She said louder, her tired shoulders sagging in defeat. "I dont have guns, or shelter or food. Nothing you could want. Seriously."

Gunner grinned in amusement.

"I aint here to rob ya sweets." He teased, reacing into his vest and handing her a cigarette. "Im here same as you are, looking for ammo. I just happened to see this thing and denied it an early supper."

Gunner kicked the spread-eagled corpse playfully.

"Here." He said handing her a ciggarette, "You look like you could use one."

Hesitantly Ally reached for the stick and waited for him to light it for her. As the smoke filled her lungs she let her eyes close, she felt the man ruffle her hair like her father had once done, and she let him. Almost gratefully, appreciating the kindness that flickered in the mans sad eyes.

* * *

Ally woke in the dark, a hazy dream fading from her mind, she blinked once and stared out the window of an old car, the rain had continued the whole night it seemed and they were parked beside an open field. Rain poured silver and fast down the window panes, carrying the dust and grime of the past months with it. Gunner was asleep in the front, his mouth slightly open. Ally remembered the picture he had on his dashboard of a blonde boy in a white karate uniform.

He had told her bits about him, trying to comfort her.

"I lost some of mine, like you did."

Ally was assaulted by the way he looked at the picture, she did not want to see his eyes grow cold the way it did when they roved over the boys face.

She didnt want to think of why the kid was not with his father.

Somewhere in the dark and the rain, thunder rolled, low and steady. Ally played with her new bandages and licked the nicotine taste from her lips, wishing badly for a toothbrush. She laid her cheek back down on the dusty seat and raised the flannel blanket up to her chin. It smelled like gasoline and Arizona dry roads...

She thought about hills and valleys, pools of water and the indian reservation her parents had taken her to long ago...The way the torquiose jewelry felt cool over sunburnt skin...

"Im going to Arizona." She told the sleeping Gunner. "Its safer there. Or Nevada perhaps."

She thought about the lonely safety of the rolling hills of desert and cactus sihouettes. Hundreds of miles away from any major city.

She watched him stir and mumble something about the hills having eyes...

Ally smirked and pressed her cheek tighter into the itchy seat. Dust drifted to the floor from where the rain pounded at the ceiling. She closed her eyes warily, letting the sound lull her to sleep.

* * *

The drought was over, the parched earth had its fill, then drowned slowly. Much of the water pooled and created streams that carried much of the sad litter downtown. Those that survived looked to the skies as a new hope, some came to see it as a sign of life being swept away...and trouble only beginning.

Ally took her time as she crouched shivering on the cold earth below the house's window. A black plastic bag covering her head. The mud swirled at her thighs and sucked at her fingers. But she wanted this more than anything.

She had watched the man raid through her food stash she had kept in the cupboards, noticed that he had long ago discarded her backpack and watched the rain break its soft fibers down into the earth.

The feel of the heaviness of the pistol in her hands comforted her, she knew what she had to do.

Gunner sat watching in the old corvette, his hands shaking as he looked up at the sky. Ally looked small and about ten years old huddled there in the muck like that. So close to a gazebo full of those things, clawing at each other hungrily...unable to get anything but a mouthful of dead flesh. They had rounded them up from the mall, and propped them up next to a house...

The poor man, he thought. He wont know half of whats about to come.

The dead creeps, as if sensing something big about to happen, gnashed their somewhat unhinged jaws in anticipation, their eyes filled with the clearing static of rain.


End file.
